After such a long and bitter dispute, the climax was no surprise.
American Conductor Lorin Maazel abruptly abrogated his contract as
director of the Vienna State Opera and resigned effective Sept. 1. Said
Austrian Minister of Education and Art Helmut Zilk, who oversees the
opera company and had clashed repeatedly with Maazel during the
conductor's 1½-year tenure: "I don't want to say anything bad about
him, but he has no manners and is a megalomaniac." Observed Maazel:
"Every three weeks we have another...